Mr. Speaker, I have to comment on the last statement about the previous Liberal government running up deficits. Au contraire, when the Liberals formed the government they inherited a $42 billion deficit and it was only after three years that we managed to eliminate it. Ever since then we had surplus budgets. We actually paid off $60 billion of debt. For the member opposite to say what she did is not just slightly inaccurate, but is totally inaccurate.
I wanted to come back to the matter of the Canada Council for the Arts. To set the stage so people will know what is at stake, on November 23 the Liberal government announced that it would invest in the next three years, until 2008, an additional $342 million. The bulk of it was basically a doubling of the budget of the Canada Council for the Arts from $150 million a year to $300 million a year, which would have meant a $50 million increase in this current fiscal year, another $100 million the following fiscal year and finally, $150 million and then keeping it at that level with an ongoing $300 million a year.
Essentially, the government was responding to the demand that we go from $5 per capita, and looking at 30 million inhabitants at $5 that would be $150 million, and doubling that to $10 per Canadian citizen over the course of three years to $300 million a year as an annual budget for the Canada Council for the Arts. This was essentially supported by all of the artistic and cultural communities in Canada.
On January 12, 2006 the Minister of Canadian Heritage, who was then the Canadian heritage critic for her party, said on CBC Radio, “We will respect the promise of $300 million for the Canada Council, which will double the budget of the organization because we believe in the importance of the council for the Canadian arts community”. Hallelujah. Of course, the last time I spoke we had just been thrown another comment by the minister who had said that the government was not going to honour any Liberal commitment, which created a lot of uncertainty. When I had a chance to speak on this in an adjournment debate it was before the budget and we did not know. Now we know it is $50 million.
Yesterday the minister thought she would quote the chair of the Canada Council in defence of the $50 million over two years. In effect, all it does is take it from $5 per capita to $6 per capita, a far cry from double the amount. I thought it would be important and essential actually that the comments she made be rebuffed by others who have also commented on the announcement by the government in the budget. Allow me to quote a few.
Christian Bédard, director of Regroupement des artistes en arts visuels du Québec, said:
Unfortunately, with this meagre increase, the cultural sector, and first of all the artists, will continue to get by as in the past, attempting to survive day by day, and keeping Canadian and Quebec artistic creation at arm's length...Cultural enterprises, the creative artists and all those working in related areas are part of an industrial sector with economic benefits that are too important to be neglected in this way.
Brian Brett, chair of the Writers’ Union, said:
The government should ... learn economics 101... Funding to the arts is returned more than 8-fold to Canada’s economy and to its tax revenue.
The Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists is concerned about the absence of increased funding for RSC, Telefilm Canada, and the Canadian Television Fund.
I will speak again after the minister's parliamentary secretary speaks.